How I understand empathy in our context: in addition to privacy and security, have empathy for your real user, who chances are is not the middle class educated fashionable 20-something from the Google commercial. Your real user might be elderly, or poor, or uneducated, or a kid, or a harried parent.

If you convinced them to pay you, maybe that money wasn't just pocket change to them. Maybe you sold them a hope for an honest well earned diversion, or something that could make their lives a bit easier or more streamlined or fulfilling. Don't sell out that hope with nagging, annoying up/cross-sells, attempts to addict, or by making the user feel unsafe and paranoid, or by tripping them up with unasked for "innovative" features/UI overhauls or confusing ux.

Given the scale at which our work is deployed, any one of us has the power to unwittingly cause, in aggregate, huge amounts of stress, as if people need any more of that these days.

Excuse the rant, this year my cynicism with a big chunk of our industry has reached a high I couldn't have imagined.

Agree.

It's sad how dependent the business models of Big Tech are on keeping users ensnared in the services they've simulated digitally. My plumber, my ISP, not even my bank demonstrate the engagement thirst of these megaliths.

Alternatively, not responding to mass media scandals as if they're indicative of real life.

Hah I was gonna say Empathy as well!